The ending of the game wiped out a lot of good memories from this one. That was one of the worse defended end of game plays that I have ever seen. Gordon followed that up by dribbling out the clock which was good because he was unconscious offensively and might have scored had he thrown up a shot.

I'm surprised to see people praising CG. I thought he was horrid. The only odd move I thought Kuester made was in the 3rd when he went with the Twin Flowers of Daye and Charles Villanueva instead of Max. I thought Max had played well in the 1st half.

This is 2 games in a row that a bunch of guys played well. Monroe could have gotten some run when CG picked up his 3rd foul in the 1st half.

Serge Ibaka tweets in 3 languages!!!

I missed Special K. He does a great job on the games.

I think I am down with sitting Daye. If that means starting Villanueva then so be it. It's only a matter of time before Joe trades for a big so how bad can it be.

Oh I almost forgot the best part, in the post game player interviews Eli says to Stuckey, "Westbrook tonight, you gotta get readY for Derrick Rose tomorrow, you don't get a night off do you"
Stuckey replies, "Naw I don't, but that's why I love this game," and here's the best part - he then says, "But they gotta get ready for me too!"
YES YES YES, He may just be getting it!!!!

Also Bengo said he took it upon himself to be more aggressive tonight and that that's how he's going to have to start playing night in and night out. I think Bengo and Stuckey are taking the proverbial torch from Rip and Tayshaun.

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Damn, I wish I had seen the postgame interview. Hopefully it'll be in the Pistons post game highlights tomorrow.

I don't care who's minutes. Give him Ben's, Daye's, Maxiell's, Prince's. It doesn't matter. If he's not good enough to play at all for one of the bottom 10 teams in the NBA... and a team without an offensive big man, then he was a bad pick.

If he's temporarily bad and just needs time to ripen, then stick him in there and let him start learning. It's not like he's going to cost us a playoff spot and a shot at a championship.

And I understand that it's entirely possible that he'd look terrible on the court right now.

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I hear ya. I wanna see the big guy play too. But, if Raw Turkey can't hold it down at all, he may spoil the rest of the team coming together. If Stuckey, Charlie, Max, and Ben are finally finding some chemistry, we might want to give them a few games to work on that before we move to the next project.

Either you throw Monroe into the fire and see what happens or you trade Rip for somebody who can start at the four or five. Other wise Monroe winds up being another Darko or Amir Johnson sitting and not learning a darn thing....and those two were on contending teams. Like LAPiston says our two centers (Ben and Max) are to old, to short and neither can be counted on to hit a FT or a jumper in the clutch

This guy is on a team that is not expected to even make the playoffs and all of sudden we have to hope that he might see some action.

Meaningless Stats Dept:

Two losses by a total of 4 pts. which mean, one play or non-missed FT and we are 2-0. Both games were tied to the FT issue as they shot 53% from the line in the first game and tonight they get out scored at the FT line by 21 pts...

The Thunder shot 39% from the floor and 2-15 from beyond the arc. Pistons shoot 47% and hit 8/12 three balls. The difference as indicated was FT where they got to the line 44 times....as they were aggressive and either we weren't aggressive enough or getting enough help from the refs..........

The game highlighted the Pistons lack of quality bigs. We finish the game with 37 year old Ben and short JMax. Neither would get quality minutes on most NBA teams. The Pistons simply are outmanned every night under the basket. No big body to clog up the middle. No tall player to snatch key rebounds. It was glaring.

The trades for Gordon and even CV were not the problem. CV needs to work off of a big center. He is what he is and that three is what he can do. The Pistons deteriorated rapidly as Sheed aged, Ben was gone and now old.

Rip, especially, and Tay would be better suited in a trade. Rip does not fit well in the offense and is a redundant player. Stuckey is indeed getting better. Stuckey, Gordon and CV would light it up playing off a center most nights. I don't think the team missed Bynum who should only be a situational player. JJ was really missed.

The team need bigs desperately. No quality big and the wins will be hard to get. No, I don't give the Thunder much credit. They were vastly overrated last year. They are a middle of the road team, I imagine. Green would not have been able to drive to the hoop like that against most NBA teams. He would have been stuffed.

I wished we has lost the last game of last season....after all why lose 11 in a row to get in position to grab a top three pick only to win four out of the last six, including the last one where you were down 16 and came back to win....one of the worst comeback victories in the history of the franchise....especially if Monroe rides the pine for most of the season.....ok I'm sorry for bringing up the past, but you open the door Linwood

We're so close, but so far away. I'm less concerned with our lineups, and more concerned why our first round pick can't get on the court. I might have to call in to sports talk in order to start something up ...

Daye at the PF spot is effecting his game on the offensive end, his shot is off and his (fragile) confidence is shaken. But I must admit there are some good things happening: Defensively Daye at the PF hasn't been completely awful. AD and CV at the PF spots are opening up tons of driving space for the guards, the floor spacing is great and the lane is often left WIDE OPEN!! But teams are killing us when they put him and CV in the pick and roll, both are utterly horrible at defending it.

Charlie Villanueva wasn't awful tonight, real good 1st half and he really came through in the clutch, the three was nice but I was more impressed with the 2 FT's he hit late after taking a good whacking across the face.

Rodney Stuckey played an AMAZING GAME!!!! Maybe the best of his career, I'm still in shock. His offensive efficiency was off the charts, he had 9 asts (thanks to a hot shooting Ben Gordon) and he made some excellent decisions tonight, he only had about 2 or 3 plays that made me yell at the TV, I'm practically crying tears of joy. Hopefully this can continue and I'll be more than happy to fire up the grill for some BBQ'd Crow.

Rip was a turnover machine but I credit Q for benching him and going with Gordo, Ben Gordon was LIGHTS OUT fantastic, simply an amazing offensive performance. Tay and Rip made Durant get his 30 on 9/24 shooting, but OKC is a team that lives at the FT line.

Q coached a decent game tonight, he had one mistake IMO, late in the game after CV hit those 2 ft's, I felt he should have subbed BenW for CV, he didn't, and sure enough on that defensive possession Ibaka got an offensive rebound because CV was ball watching instead of boxing out his man, Ben would have got that rebound! But then OKC probably would have fouled him anyway......

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Tay completely lost his outside shot when he played power forward for Curry.Predictable. You get the daylights beat out of you, it affects your shot. Sure, Daye has been ok guarding his own man. But if you look a bit closer at how the NBA works - you got to guard your own man while often giving help to the center. Daye is a failure at pf in that respect, never giving Ben an iota of help.

Now, if we had Darko on our team, it would be different. He does not need help guarding anyone. But Ben Wallace, as short as he is, better get help or we are in trouble. (Comment generated simply from watching Darko make Bogut look like a raw rookie tonight.)

fun game...but we simply can't rebound. the turnovers were bad but man, easy boards turn into boards for the other team. ben isn't as good as last year and he's noticeably slowed down.

daye looks like a different player than the preseason. his body language looks like last year - i think he had such a bad 1st game that he was looking for redemption. unfortunately you could see in his head he was panicking, thinking about having to make every shot so he wouldn't have another bad game. with every miss it got worse. it's in his head right now and he's just not playing confidently.

i'm glad gordon just decided 'i got this' and played his game, and that stuckey stayed aggressive and played his.

on the radio show after it was hinted that rip is in the starting lineup due to some politics and that you have to showcase him to trade him. who knows. and matt dery said he talked to coach before the game who said they were worried about monroe's ability to get back on defense against 2 athletic teams. so yeah. i still think he should play...we are so undersized.

Tay completely lost his outside shot when he played power forward for Curry.Predictable. You get the daylights beat out of you, it affects your shot. Sure, Daye has been ok guarding his own man. But if you look a bit closer at how the NBA works - you got to guard your own man while often giving help to the center. Daye is a failure at pf in that respect, never giving Ben an iota of help.

Now, if we had Darko on our team, it would be different. He does not need help guarding anyone. But Ben Wallace, as short as he is, better get help or we are in trouble. (Comment generated simply from watching Darko make Bogut look like a raw rookie tonight.)

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I don't disagree with any of that, especially the part about Daye not having Ben's back, but you at least have to acknowledge that the spacing on offense with AD and CV at the PF spot is pretty good.

fun game...but we simply can't rebound. the turnovers were bad but man, easy boards turn into boards for the other team. ben isn't as good as last year and he's noticeably slowed down.

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Yes he has and this is when Monroe will start to see minutes, I see Ben's minutes being cut to about 20 and this is when Monroe will start to get a steady dose of spot minutes and start to cut his teeth.

warthog256626]daye looks like a different player than the preseason. his body language looks like last year - i think he had such a bad 1st game that he was looking for redemption. unfortunately you could see in his head he was panicking said:
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on the radio show after it was hinted that rip is in the starting lineup due to some politics

I was rearranging my bedroom during the chat last night, so I couldnt post much, but here is my 'OLDCAP" from last night:

1. We never let OKC pull away. I think that is key for a team that has no identity. Maybe we can be known as the team 'that never quits working'.
2. Imagine if we had just ONE garbage man-type of big that can give us 24 minutes. we havent had a rough big man on this team of 6'10" or taller since......???...even the 2004 team never had a powerful big man. Even the team before that started Uncle Cliffy.
3. We made Serge Ibaka look like Hakeem Olajuwon! Why cant we find us one of those..Im searching D-league list today cuz there has to be somebody tougher than Chris Wilcox and Greg Monroe. This is why you cant fear people just cuz they 'appear'bigger than u. Ive always had some 'Little Seymour' in me...why cant Monroe find his???
4. Daye cant start any more...end of story. We have scoring off the bench with gordon alone. So start Vilanueloser and take your lumps, Joe. 'YOU signed ' him, so ...Daye is a not ready for prime time player. AGAIN, a reason why exhibition games are MEANINGLess!!!
5. What do these siisyfied primadonnas do in college or before they get to the show? Now all of sudden, Monroe and daye realize they need to strenghten up? Villosernueva needs muscle? Durant is as small as all three of them and he's all world! ITS ABOUT HEART NOT SIZE!
6, Give Gordon the ball. Run the offense through him. He is 16 of 22 in two games. Nuff said.

Well, we are 0-2 so my 26-56 prediction is on the way. But the reason is this: If we cant win games vs the NETS and OKC at home, that we COULD have won, what makes anyone think they gonna consistently win any more games that they SHOULDNT have won???

The Daye plan didn't work the first two games because he's playing tight and missing his shots.

But here's the thing: That won't keep happening for too long - Daye is a big time shot maker. When he settles in and relaxes, then we'll be able to judge Daye in the lineup. He really isn't playing bad defensively - he changes a lot of shots out there because of his great length.

The point is not to give up on the Daye PF experiment. I'm imagining him playing a lot with Gordon and perhaps also CV -- we'll be a freaking impossible team to guard when they all get cooking. With that lineup, Stuckey will have lanes to drive like you cannot believe.

they were pretty tame. but man, they have GREAT seats in the lower bowl. they paraded them out before the start of the game and they were all wearing red shirts and started doing some "let's go pistons" chants. they were supposed to be standing the whole game but by about the 3rd quarter a bunch of them had sat down. they simply weren't loud enough to get anyone into the game, and on top of that the current fans that go to the palace are so apathetic that it probably wouldn't have gotten them going anyway. but i was surprised how quiet they were.

the palace did get louder in the 4th when gordon was unconscious, but when there's under a minute left in a close game everyone should be standing. only about half the lower bowl did and i was like the only person in my section standing. when V hit the 3 to give us the lead everyone finally got up.

Raw turkey simply ain't no good (at least not good enough yet). Every time I see Cousins play I hate the fact that he could have been a Piston if we hadn't won for nothing at the end of last season more and more

It's a marathon, not a sprint. Cousins is a big time talent, and he may or may not be a big time headache. Monroe also has a ton of ability, is never going to be a headache. He's 20. Give him time to develop.

It's a marathon, not a sprint. Cousins is a big time talent, and he may or may not be a big time headache. Monroe also has a ton of ability, is never going to be a headache. He's 20. Give him time to develop.

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Yes, but with Cousins, it's high risk, high reward. With Monroe it's a lower risk but his ceiling is way lower than Cousins. And at this point, the team needed a player with as much upside as Cousins, even if he fails due to his behaviour - when you're as bad as the Pistons, you need a game changer and Cousins may become one, while I doubt that with Monroe